


Honeydipped

by chiropteranpudding



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: F/M, Gore, Original Plot, Romance, eventual tasteful smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-19
Updated: 2015-08-28
Packaged: 2018-04-15 12:45:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4607244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chiropteranpudding/pseuds/chiropteranpudding
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tatara, a silent and sadistic leader of Aogiri, is an aficionado of sorts when it comes to blending in with humans. An innocent trip out of his apartment could lead to a compromising infatuation with a sweet-scented human. Tatara & OC, because why not?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Ace

**I thought Tatara needed some more well-deserved recognition. Inspired by other stories featuring him. Set in Tatara's point of view. _Enjoy, hopefully!_**

* * *

Walking out of my meagerly dim apartment, I pushed my black sunglasses higher up on the bridge of my nose. The door shut with a muted little  _thud_. I looked back and forth between each side of myself before I casually strode down the hallway, down some stairs, and out onto the swamped streets of Tokyo. Standing still, I watched mopeds zoom by, observing the faint bits of hair peeking out from under glistening helmets. With every inward breath through my nose, I could smell leftover curry buns from the common Kare Pan food truck, salt in the air from an old toothless man's shioyaki stand, fish flakes that had fallen onto the street in front of an umbrella-clad takoyaki cart. I often wondered what they would taste like, if my tongue were of the human kind.

I could stand out here all afternoon, but the drifting food steam would always smell the same to me.

Repulsive. Foul. Nauseating.

But once you blocked those nuisances out, there was deliciousness in the air. The red hot, spicy pulsing of a delicious natural blonde's carotid artery. Strolling by me on the sidewalk, the pale flesh of a university student, seasoned with sweat and oil. A suit-adorned business man, the squelching of his entrails as he bent down to pick up a long-forgotten 5 yen coin.

Ah, Tokyo was like a buffet. Pickled pancreas on a stick. Fermented jugular stew. My teeth picking their little femur toothpicks clean.

Forcing my legs to walk forward with ease, my leather flip flops clopped against the asphalt. Light-washed jeans swam around my ankles, meeting at my waist with a plain white cotton t-shirt. White creamy-colored hair smoothed down against my head, pardon a few hairs sticking up near my cowlick. Ruby eyes hidden behind cheap polarized sunglasses. Breathing normally as I walked, my ghoulish sense of smell detecting every tempting bodily function of humans that passed.

It was daylight, and I had self control. Much more than most.

When you considered the redundant patterns of raw human behavior, blending in was almost too easy.

* * *

"That'll be 800 yen!" The young cashier flaunted her pearly white teeth, smiling at me. It was certainly forced. Her pulse picked up, I could smell it. Silently, I handed her the money and moved to sit down in a booth. After my coffee was served to me, I politely muttered a  _thank you._

Tipping the white cup towards my lips, I took a drink. A mouthful of dark, earthy flavor.

Ah, yes.

Through my sunglasses, I observed my surroundings between each small sip.

Faint sound of the brewing of a freshly-ground French roast. A few childlike fingerprint smudges on the otherwise clean front windows. The aqueous squishing heartbeats of a younger couple a few tables over.

A short brunette with wire-framed glasses outside on the sidewalk, stopping to trifle through her seemingly-messy bag.

Even through the windows' glass, I could smell her.

A sweet honey-coated scent, accented with a light coating of sweat and beet sugar and red bean paste and type B- blood and wagashi cakes. She suddenly looked around, her gray irises freezing at the sight of me looking her way through my tinted glasses. Her face developed a reddish tint, and I could smell every patchy splotch of blood that was embarrassingly pooling under the apples of her cheeks.

My eyes could've rolled into the back of my head, but I managed to keep my composure.

Suddenly, my cup of coffee didn't taste nearly as sweet.

As she started to stumble away, I was quick to finish my drink and stand up from my seat. The late-afternoon color of the clouds indicated that I had enough cover to follow this delicacy until I could get her alone long enough to snap her neck and lick the saccharine scent off of her flesh.

Bowing to my server before leaving, I strolled over to the door and leisurely stepped out. Even if I didn't catch up to her, I could surely follow her sweet aroma. It was stronger without the hindering window glass.

Every ghoul had their taste preferences, s _he so happened to be mine._

And I couldn't wait to feel the marinated pores of her bones crunching between my molars.

* * *

The descending sun was dimming the sky to a pale greenish-blue. She was several meters in front of me, soft footfalls and slow but steady pace. It wasn't difficult to keep up from a distance. Travelling somewhere on foot in a pretty much vacant side street… she made a mistake on her part.

Even from back here, she smelled  _fathoms_  better than any street food. She wreaked of a sweet but timid exterior.

So when the stench of lesser human's disappeared, I was quick to sprint forward and roughly grab a fistful of her hair. Powerfully, I half-shoved her in between two run-down buildings.

" _Hn!"_  She whimpered quietly in surprise, just barely audible. Her heartbeat quickened, delicious blood seething through each vein and artery, just out of reach. Grunting, I thrusted her against one of the brick walls of the alley. Her glasses hit the pavement with a sharp  _tink._

I took a look at her, darkened wide eyes staring up at me as I gripped her hair harder. Licking my chapped lips, she let her bag slide off of her shoulder and thud to the filthy ground. She was very still. A meal  _this_ enticing wasn't even a fighter? Tsk, a shame. I usually preferred some action prior to a snack.

Faster than she could comprehend, my front was pressed to her. We were both deathly still against the wall, my nose ghosting just under her jaw and inhaling her rare scent, obnoxiously and pointedly. Her jugular ticked faster underneath her skin, a loud gulp coming from her throat. It almost made me grin.

"If you're going to do it, then do it already," she spoke shakily and softly in a monotone.

My eyebrows knit together. Surely, no one this sweet-smelling could ever exude such a cold demeanor. I found myself chuckling against her skin, low and breathy and hushed. She gulped again, the smell of a fresh blush traveling down her neck.

"Are you frightened?" I whispered.

" _No."_

My nose sniffed the air once more. "Your pulse tells me otherwise."

She didn't reply, just let out a shaky breath. Hm, she was interesting. My tongue dared to peek out from between my lips and lick underneath her jawline, slowly and knowingly. Her breath hitched, making me grin. She still didn't move. It wasn't like she could anyway, with my long deliberate fingers fisting her hair and keeping her in place.

"This is a bit sadistic for a ghoul, isn't it?" She breathed airily. I didn't answer her. My tongue licked her flesh again, making her give out a small whimper.  _"I'm not scared."_

She remained motionless, intriguing me even further. Why wasn't she struggling? Did she even  _value_  her own life? Frozen like this, there wasn't a single emanating drop of survival coming from her. She was poised stiffly against the wall, pressed close to my front, not even attempting to strain against my fingers twisted roughly in her hair. There was no fight in her, just the desire to show off her feigned bravery.

Strength wasn't so easy to fake when her nervous gulps overpowered her quickening heartbeat under that oh-so-tempting flesh.

But she wasn't kicking and screaming at me to spare her negligible little life.

Nose tickling the skin of her jaw, I took one last deep inhale of her honey-coated scent and parted from her. Walking away, hands digging into my pockets. I preferred to fight for my meals.

When I looked back over my shoulder, she hadn't moved. I could smell her salty, frightened tears.

She must not have been as brave as she'd thought.

Sometimes, apathy earns you a second chance.

I walked home, leaving the trembling yet fragrant ace of this Tokyo buffet behind.

* * *

**Reviews are welcome! Thanks for reading! \\(^~*)/**


	2. Tick

**Tatara is 182 centimeters of witty, stoic man baby. Bit of a time skip, about a month or so.**

* * *

I hadn't eaten in a few weeks. Common sense knows that I had to be careful with my eating habits, especially with the 11th ward's rising CCG numbers within the past few months. Keeping solid composure around silver suitcases has always been child's play for someone as experienced as myself. Even so, it wasn't clever for a ghoul of  _any_  level of skill to go around pettily plucking bottom-rung humans left and right. It merely attracted unwanted attention from investigators. Fortunately, I'd grown to possess nearly unyielding self control.

But that didn't stop my mouth from watering when I walked in the streets.

I could push the pooling saliva to the back of my mind, but ignoring the smouldering hunger was a voluntary form of willpower that was inconvenient yet bearable. It was similar to declining a dessert, for the sake of maintaining one's own weight.

So when my feet froze in front of a blue-awning coin laundry, the familiar honeydipped scent made my eyes widen and nostrils flare.

The girl. I could remember the savory, piquant taste of her neck's sweat on my tongue after I shoved her against the brick wall of the alley.  _"If you're going to do it, then do it already,"_ her soft shaky voice rang through my mind.

Mouth watering, my hand was on the cool metal handle of the coin laundry's glass-windowed door before I could chastise my own lack of constraint.

If I could spare her life, she could spare me one more whiff of her tantalizing skin.

* * *

She was sorting her clothes into darks and whites. Her shoulder-length hair kept falling in her eyes as she leaned over to place different things into the washer, shyly bunching up her undergarments into little balls before tossing them in. Her modesty nearly had me chuckling in my seat.

Even from the chair that I was sat in, arms and legs crossed as I observed from a distance, every movement of her hair wafted her ambrosial scent closer and let it ricochet off of the finely sensitive hairs of my nostrils. For my flesh-craving stomach, it was pleasant yet heavy-handed torture.

Her small, delicate hands fed the washing machine yen coins and pressed buttons without hesitation. She must take her laundry here regularly, I noted.

When she grabbed her bag and began to move towards the group of chairs to wait at the end of the narrow coin laundry, she stopped mid-step as she saw my tall frame occupying a seat.

She swallowed, her throat bobbing. We locked eyes for the first time, without the barrier of my sunglasses. Red meeting a soft, cautious gray.

_Hm._ This silence, other than the muted tumbling of water in the machines, had me pondering. Her expression said it all: alert, uneasy, almost offended. I hadn't thought she would recognize me without my shaded glasses and subtle change of clothes. It had been at least a month since our little trip to the alleyway.

My sound judgment discerned that she was a perceptive woman, after all. I would exercise caution with this one.

As she moved her bag higher up on her shoulder, hardly blinking behind her glasses, she strode over to a chair that was farthest from me.

Rather than sitting in it, she let its metal legs drag as she pushed it pointedly across the squeaky tile floor. The keen screeching stopped near a group of washing machines. She didn't dare look in my direction as she judged that it was a safe distance away from me before plopping down onto it.

I could hear the nervous pumping of blood swimming in and out through her aorta. My mouth was watering once again.

She avoided eye contact completely, digging in her bag and snatching a cream-colored book out of it. Her nimble fingers felt for a bookmark before flipping open the pages and staring at the print. She was almost tangibly working hard to focus on something other than my threatening, baneful presence about ten meters away.

I watched her until the washers she was using made a sharp dinging noise, signaling the wash cycles were complete.

She hadn't flipped a page of her book even once.

She stood up from her chair to load her damp clothes into the dryers, doing so quickly and sloppily, allowing small pieces of clothing to drop to the dirty floor in a rush. Picked them up and shoved them in, slamming the circular door of the dryer closed and pushing more buttons. It wasn't long before she was back in her chair, focusing on the same sentence that she'd been staring at for god knows how long.

So I took the opportunity to inhale, letting her sweet-smelling skin entice my ghoulish stomach.

It growled. Albeit, loudly.

Her eyes were on me in seconds. Curiosity and a hint of apprehension.

"My apologies," I said, my voice steady and quiet and deep, as my head made a polite bowing gesture. She collected herself and went back to her literary stare-off.

The corner of my lip quirked up, just barely.

Later, when her clothes were dry, she folded them haphazardly and shoved them in a cotton laundry bag. Pulling the string and letting the top pucker up and close, she stood up to leave.

She made a little grunt as she lifted the thing. Eyes wide open, averting my stare. Her voice was strained from holding the weight of her laundry.

"Please don't follow me home," she pleaded softly as she walked past me towards the door. My eyebrows rose.

Smart girl.

"Are you paranoid?"

She stopped, silent. Her hair covered her face.

"There's no need to be," I assured her, doubting the words even though they were coming from my own hungry mouth.

"Why not?" She wondered aloud, facing away from me. I felt my eye twitch, choosing not to answer.

She sensed the silence, and left, heaving the bag of clothing along with her.

Her scent lingered in the coin laundry, and so did I.

* * *

The next time I smelled honey in the streets, I savored it. Let the scent drip from my nostrils and onto my tongue, imagined sugar-concentrated blood running past my tonsils and down to my stomach.

From afar, I could see her in a lavender-colored shirt. Top layers of her dark hair pinned back, glasses perched low on her nose.

Just as she was confused by me, I was also confused by her.

Even if I craved it, her scent sparked curiosity inside me. I found myself comparing her to every meal that I ate, concluding that their flesh didn't taste as sweet as how  _her's_  had smelled. The thought was never  _roaring_  at me, just a mere whisper that would occasionally tick on the back of my skull.

She smelled like a juicy segment of kidney, ripped fresh from a newly-made corpse and marinated in a mixture of piping-hot blood and beet sugar and rice wine.

Like a delicacy so rare, it was not to be eaten nor even touched.

By anything but  _my_  hands or tongue.

Especially when I zeroed in on the book tucked under her arm, titled  _Ghoul Encyclopedia_ by Yuudai Sawamura.

My sandal-clad feet romped between buzzing mopeds and the veering of street bikers. Tuning out the harsh beating of pedestrians' hearts, I followed behind her.

The wind was blowing southeast today, right through her hair and into my nostrils.

She bounded up a cement set of library steps, unaware of my presence. While she took one stair step at a time, my long legs took two. I followed her all the way to the reference section, standing behind a tall shelf to watch her scan ratty book spines with her fingers. The musty odor of aged paper couldn't overpower the lubbing and dubbing of blood through her chest.

She still had the  _Ghoul Encyclopedia._

"Why do you have that?" I questioned, referencing to the book under her arm.

" _Tch!"_  She jumped, startled. Her neck making a soft  _crack_  as it whipped to the side, her eyes landed on my chest. Going up to the neck of my white cotton t-shirt, to my chin, to my nose, up to my burgundy-colored eyes. Her face went from shocked, to panic-stricken, to uneasy.

She looked away, eyes cast back to the bookshelf. She plucked another book from the shelf, titled  _RC Cell Anatomy._

"Just personal research." She murmured, licking the pad of her finger and paging quickly through the book. "Ukaku, koukaku, rinkaku, bikaku… which RC type do you have?"

I inhaled the wafting honey, and stared at her.

She was an interesting one.

* * *

**Thank you to those that are reading! I appreciate the feedback. Next chapter will hopefully be uploaded soon.**


	3. Practice

"You don't talk very much, do you?" She questioned softly after I didn't answer, continuing to page through the library book. I caught glimpses of flashy diagrams of kakuhou and a layered cross-section of fortified RC cell epithelial tissue.

"There isn't very much need to," I commented honestly.

She nodded slowly, eyes flicking across pictures and captions.

"Why are you here?"

"You have a… strong scent." I inhaled loudly, resisting the urge to look at her and let my tongue run across my lips. She paused at that, contemplating silently.

"Hm," was all she muttered, carefully placing all of the books back onto the shelf. "But I'm still alive, huh."

Ah, she certainly was perceptive.

I whispered now.  _"You must think me an idiot to speak about such matters in public."_  Being one of the heads of Aogiri, I'd learned better by now than to bring to light that part of myself in the presence of others that could hear.

"Would you tell me if we were alone?" She dug her empty hands into the shallow pockets of her jeans, looking at the salt-and-pepper gray of the library carpet.

_Would I? A human with any common sense would tip off the CCG._

"Perhaps," I looked down, straight at the flushed skin of her temple. "You aren't scared to be alone with me?"

She looked up at my tall frame, at least a head or two taller than her.

"I am," she said, voice wavering towards the end. Her left hand rubbed tensely against her opposite shoulder. "Let's go."

As she strode to the librarian's desk to renew the  _Ghoul Encyclopedia,_ I waited outside the doors of the entrance with my arms crossed over my chest.  _"Yaki Imo! Yaki Imo! Yaki Imo!"_  A middle aged women yelled from her truck of roasting sweet potatoes, attempting to attract customers from a distance. There was a light smell of a burning wood fire, smoke billowing from the open top of the truck. The cooking yaki imo smelled vile.

I could smell the girl coming out of the library long before I heard her.

"Lead the way," I prodded, trailing off as I became unsure of how to address her. I didn't bother to look at her… merely inhaling the aroma of her dark hair as she approached.

"Ishikawa Naomi," she spoke timidly, her head bowing quickly and politely.

She should be cleverly cautious enough to give out a fake name. Yet, judging by her facial expressions and gestures, she appeared to be genuine.

How naive.

I leaned close to her, ghosting the threat under my breath.  _"Ishikawa-san, if you show even the_ smallest _intent to contact the CCG, I will pick the meat clean off of your bones without batting an eye."_

* * *

"So, what are you? Bikaku, rinkaku…?"

"Bikaku."

"...I thought so. How fast can your kagune regenerate?"

"Quickly."

"Wait, how often do you eat a human?"

"I eat when I am hungry."

Naomi's questions and shy exclamations were endless.

We were between two buildings. She was standing on the ground of the empty alley, her back pressed to one wall as I stood with my back to the opposite one. She seemed quaint and small, especially whilst I looked down at her in this way. There was a broad triangle of light peeking into the shaded place, occasionally flickering when a person passed, usually on a bicycle.

I was beginning to think that noses were especially interesting. A human's sense of smell was adequate, but a ghoul's was similar to that of a rottweiler. Predatory in defense, excitable in offense. But like all of the body's senses, it adapts over time.

Smells fade, dwindle out, become redundant. They are simple to tune out.

But not her.

Naomi smelled flushed and sweet, all the time. Like raw honey with small bits of bumble bee fuzz and leftover honeycomb. It didn't fade like other scents did, every inhale of air just as tempting as the one before.

It was apparent that I was stuck between wanting to rip the flesh from her shoulders or wanting to dig my nose in her hair to breathe her in. I seriously pondered over the thought of both.

"What are you thinking so hard about?" I heard her murmur gently, gazing up at me from behind her pair of wire-framed glasses.

"Your scent," I answered with honesty, joining my hands in front of my stomach and leaning my back further into the wall. Her cheeks reddened after a few moments, but she spoke with that same curiosity anyway.

"Is it… a  _bad_  smell?"

I pictured my hands ripping through the flesh of her stomach to get to her slippery, blood-coated viscera.

"You ask a lot of questions," I pointed out, narrowing my eyes a bit at her.

"Because, you don't like to answer them," she speedily quipped, looking down at her hands. "You're… inside your head."

"I've answered nearly every question you've asked, Ishikawa-san."

"Vaguely," she said faintly with a frustrated little huff.

Did this girl have a death wish? She was swimming in an apathetic demeanor, immobile at the idea of the approaching possibility of a violent, painful end.

"What do you want to hear, then?" I inquired with intensity, composure wavering ever-so-slightly. She felt my cold stare.

There was a long, silent pause. "Why haven't you killed me yet?" She looked away, a thick wrinkle on her light-colored shirt.

"I prefer food that fights back." Pushing away from the wall, I stepped dangerously closer to her, watching her wide averted eyes. "You reek of indifference." My hands smacked down onto the wall on either side of her body, closing her in. I could hear her heart accelerate, blood moving languid and quick through her veins. She was so close. The redder her face turned, the more her soft-pedalled freckles receded into the patchy yet sensitive skin below her eyes. Though turned away, her pupils were dilated and alert, surrounded by string-like, circling, pearly gray irises. Sometimes, I forgot that humans could be charming.

If I just leaned down a few inches and let my teeth tear off a bite, I'm positive Naomi would taste as delightful as she smelled.

"I won't fight a ghoul," her quiet and uneasy voice broke my concentration. "I've seen what happens when someone does." The smell of her breath tickled the short hair of my sideburns. I closed my eyes and sniffed loudly so she could hear, giving a satisfied little exhale when her breath hitched.

"You're quite clever," I whispered to her, bumping my nose against her jaw and letting it rest there. She let out shaky breaths.

In one quick movement, she ducked under my arm and stepped away. Her voice made her seem small. "I'm not a toy."

I called after her. "You certainly aren't." But she was.

There were forgotten pieces of plywood farther down the alley, leaning against the brick wall with all their filth and dust. Compared to that, I could admit that she smelled beautiful. Like something I could stumble across again and again, stomach growling and saliva pooling next to my gums, and still be relieved to breathe her in.

* * *

About a week later, I could smell her following me.

"What do you want?" I quipped after a while, halting my steps on the sidewalk. Her feet stopped as well, but she stayed silent. With a short-tempered sigh, I slid my hands in the pockets of my loose jeans and turned around.

The streets were busy, but there she stood. Hunched shoulders and a cream-colored shirt, neck humming with her pulse. With two fingers, she pushed her glasses up higher on her nose, a sheepish look on her face.

" _Well?"_  I prodded, monotone and straight-faced.

"I was just- I, ah, I wanted to know if you'd, ah… talk to me." She pushed a piece of fawn-colored hair behind her ear, looking at me expectantly and waiting for an answer.

"...Talk?" I mimicked, my thin ivory-colored eyebrow quirking up slightly.

She was puzzling.

"Yes," she nodded, massaging her hands together tensely.

"About?"

Her shoulders shrugged.  _"Anything,_  really," she went on. "You never answered my questions from last time."

The woman had quite a memory.

"Ishikawa-san," I started, watching the sunlight reflect off of the surface of her glasses. "You're awfully per-"

Suddenly, a sour-smelling business man with a black leather suitcase rammed his shoulder into me hurriedly from behind, sending me balking forward. I caught myself with ease, snapping my head in his direction as he rushed away on his cell phone. In my mind, I could picture myself diving forward to plunge my hands into him, separating his ribcage in half with a sickening  _crack._

Bad manners have always infuriated me. I found myself licking my lips discreetly with a sinisterly curled tongue, narrowed eyes boring holes into his retreating figure. I could already fantasize over the salty, coppery taste of his blood.

Looking back to Naomi, she watched me with fascinated, startled eyes. My brow twitched.

"Are you… hungry?" She wondered aloud, coming closer and bending her neck up to look at me. Her skin looked soft from up here, receding into her speckled hairline and glossy with a light sheen of sweat. Her scent wafted up to my nose.

"Yes," I shut my eyes and inhaled. When I opened them again, she was sporting a small, timid grin.

"Do I smell good?" She mused, curious and shy, standing on the tips of her toes to study me.

" _Yes,"_  I answered again honestly, eyeing the barely-there specks of salty but sweet-smelling liquid forming on her brow.

Her sugar-scented sweat was tempting me, mouth-watering and close. I wondered if it was on purpose.

Examining my expression thoughtfully, she looked amused.

"Don't assume that because others can see us, you are safe to  _taunt_  me," I threatened, half-lidding my eyes and inhaling the sweet honey again. She blinked.

" _I apologize."_  Her head bowed quickly and politely, but her small grin stayed. Even though it was taunting, I didn't necessarily mind. I was too concentrated on the overwhelming hankering for the taste of her sweat on my tongue.

I've always been easily credited for my self-restraint, patience, and endurance.

This clever woman was certainly making me practice.

* * *

**Thanks for reading. I appreciate the feedback!**


	4. Meat

**This chapter's a little longer than the others. Enjoy, hopefully!**

* * *

"I read online that ghouls can drink coffee," Naomi blurted, breaking the silence. I looked around cautiously to see if other humans were around. A group of brown-suited corporate men stood around in a small circle, one of the younger ones taking notes. Seeing that, I decided to be safe about my answer.

"Is that so?" I stared at her newly-inquisitive expression, half sarcastic but dousing it with a monotone. She nodded, giving a small smile.

"I could go for some, right about now," she looked down at the pavement chastely, eyeing my sandal-clad feet for a moment. "Could  _you?_ I mean,  _can_  you drink coffee?"

Did I smell a blush on her cheeks?

"Yes, I enjoy it," I replied, sticking a hand in my pocket absentmindedly as I watched a light-haired woman stroll past, holding hands with a timid-looking boy. Her scent was hardly distinguishable behind all of her perfume, but the child smelled  _pleasing._ "Soothes my hunger a little. Might be good, right about now." A corner of my lips quirked up just slightly, looking down at her sweat-speckled temples.

I could almost taste it.

" _Ah,_  great!" She stuttered shyly underneath my stare, lifting her hand to straighten her glasses a bit. "I know a place, if you don't mind."

"Not at all," I said amiably, gesturing for her to lead the way. She turned and walked ahead, a slight swing in her step as she ran a hand through her hair and continued on. Her neck spun over her shoulder once to make sure I was following her, but other than that, she didn't look nor speak to me the entire way.

The 11th ward seemed quieter today. Very few mopeds, very few street workers, very few university students traveling in groups on the sidewalks. A young woman pedaled and zipped by on a bicycle, a fresh produce-filled wire basket haphazardly attached to the back with wire and yellow string.

I could appreciate this relative calmness. Perhaps the lack of activity meant that it was going to storm. I rather liked rain.

When we reached the quaint little cafe, I realized that it was one that I frequented often. They made an excellent French roast.

"I've been here before," I relaxedly thought aloud, pushing open the door and letting the familiar chime make a soft  _ring._

"I know, I remember."

I took her memory for granted, at times.

Faintly, I could again picture myself sitting in the shop's booth whilst sipping a mouthful of coffee. Outside, Naomi was rummaging through her bag. That instance was the first whiff of her that I had ever had. She was even stronger than the coffee.

Coming out of the memory, I responded. "You remember a lot of things."

"Mm," she hummed, agreeing distractedly as she stared up at the menu board. She looked thoughtful, like this very choice on its own would affect her for the rest of the day. Pursed lips, dimpled chin, eyes scanning up and down.

After we both paid for our orders, Naomi picked a clean booth for us to plop down onto. I peered out the window at people in the street, with their hurried steps and glistening necks and ignorance to my stare.

"Long Black coffee and a Caffè Americano?" A waiter pressed about a minute later, tray in hand, our drinks balanced on it.

"Arigatou!" Naomi thanked with a bow of her head, smiling a little at her steaming coffee as it was placed in front of her.

"Black coffee, huh?" I questioned quietly once the waiter had scurried away. Considering that most women drowned their drinks with sugar and cream, her choice came as a small surprise.

"Mhm," she replied, distracted again. Her eyes hardly blinked as she watched me lift my cup to my mouth and take a sip.

" _Ah,"_  I sighed, feeling the warmth slither down my throat as I swallowed. Looking across the table to her, she seemed to be attempting to contain her dumbfounded curiosity.

"So ghouls  _can_  drink coffee. Huh."

Looking around casually, it didn't appear that anyone was paying any attention to us.

"Oi. Choose your words carefully in public," I warned quietly, voice deep and low. The last thing I needed was for someone to overhear; just another person I would need to dispose of. Her gray eyes were widened a little.

"I wasn't thinking," she apologized, looking down into her drink and tapping the rim of the mug softly with her index finger. "Does it taste differently to you than it does to other people?"

"I wouldn't know, I'm  _not_  other people."

"Ah."

I didn't reply, just brought my cup to my lips again in an effort to stifle a little bit of my hunger. A younger man with a small hair bun sat at the corner of the cafe, transfixed by his laptop with a paper to-go coffee container frozen halfway to his mouth. He had a faint musky smell, like he hadn't showered in a day or two. Heart sounding slow, the blood moseying along through his cuspids, trickling through until the next batch came. My stomach growled impatiently. In my periphery, Naomi's eyes landed on me.

"Apologies," I muttered, looking her in the eye as I drank more of my coffee. We kept eye contact for a long time, like she was studying me without having to really look at me. I thought of how tempting she smelled, how her scent never really dissipated. The wave of her dark hair, the flutter of her hand, the blinking of her eyelashes would bring it closer and closer. I was practically taking a bath in something that I couldn't have.

For now, at least.

"You're still hungry, huh?" She finally said, gripping her cup with two hands.

"Yes," I admitted, glancing out the window. "But at this level, it's bearable."

"When's the last time you ate?"

I had to think about that one. "A little less than a week," I said, hushed. Her eyes instantly widened, surprised and inquisitive.

"But I thought eating once a month was  _more_  than enough," she queried, setting her drink down on the table. For a ghoul of my strength, it was common to eat more frequently. The strong must remain strong. To a human, what is the proper way to phrase that?

"By eating often, I can remain strong."

She blinked. "Are you strong for your kind?"

"Yes."

"I see." She sipped her drink. "You  _do_  have… an aura."

"An aura?"

"Mhm," she mumbled before sipping her drink. "Like you'd snap my neck, then politely thank me for the meal."

I smirked at that one, just barely. "You're fairly assuming, Ishikawa-san." I let more coffee rinse my mouth.

"Just curious, is all…  _ghoul-san."_  She whispered the last part shyly. Her breath smelled sweet, like freshly-filtered espresso beans mixed together with honey.

"Kojima Tatara," I said, hesitant in mind yet firm in voice. "You can call me Tatara."

"Tatara-san," she confirmed with a satisfactory little smile. "So do you work?"

A few times a week, I'd meet at Aogiri Tree base to plan basic missions. I was the strategist, Noro was the brawn, Bin brothers were the ambush, Ayato kept everyone in line, and Eto was… well, she came along to watch. We were paid well for every successful mission. Money flows down to us, we don't ask where it comes from. From what I've gathered, I assume large-scale corporations and the higher-ups give generous donations in a vain attempt to eliminate the competition and keep our explosives a safe distance away.

"Yes, I work."

"What do you do?" She questioned curiously after swallowing a sip of her black coffee.

I pierce CCG members through their bellies, let them bleed out on the floor next to their comrades. I strategize which Special Class Investigator the team should rip the limbs off of. On weekends, I use my kagune to flip police cars over onto their backs.

"I can't exactly talk about that," I countered, eyeing a crumb on the table. Pressing my finger down on it, I watched as it stuck to my skin for a moment before falling back down again. "I am _alive_  because I am careful."

"Understandable." She looked away, briefly raising her eyebrows appreciatively. The movement made by her head wafted her scent nearer, and after a moment, I inhaled it as casually as I could. My eyes shuddered in their sockets, just slightly.

"What does it feel like?" Her voice was soft. When I stared at her blankly, she elaborated. "The hunger, I mean."

Her fascination for all things ghoulish still baffled me.

"It's all I've ever known," I offered, watching her study me with rich, glossy eyes.  _"Hunger is hunger._  There is nothing to compare it to."

For a minute, she looked thoughtful. Her lips were pressed together, eyes were very still, hands secure around her coffee cup. "I suppose you're right."

It was quiet for a while, both of us looking out the window at all of the bicyclists and strollers and middle-aged men in wrinkled suits. Somewhere in that time, I had finished my coffee, eyeing the small caramel-colored pool that lingered at the cup's bottom. It had helped a bit with my hungry stomach, but as I continued to watch the humans walk out in the streets, drool was collecting at the sides of my gums.

"You should go and get something to eat."

"Yes," I replied to her, nodding slowly but continuing to stare through the window as the sun started to disappear. Somewhere behind my ears, there was a hungry stinging.

"I'll be leaving first, then," she said, hooking her bag over her shoulder and sliding out of the booth onto her feet. When I turned and looked at her, she bowed to me politely. "Mata ne, Tatara-san." Her voice was dripping in sweetness, I thought I may drown. But when she turned her back, honey-scented hair flouncing against her shoulder, I thought I may drown in that instead.

"Mata ne," I quietly muttered back a goodbye, attempting to compose my twitching mouth, although she was already halfway out the door.

" _Ki wo tsukete!"_  She called over her shoulder to the workers behind the counter. After that, the door chimed shut, and she was gone. Her heartbeat sounded muffled, until it was lost altogether.

* * *

Just like in the coin laundry, her scent lingered.

Without an ounce of shame, I contemplated snatching her cup in my hands and licking where her mouth had been. Even with the black coffee, I'm sure it would taste sweet.

My stomach grumbled.

I've eaten humans smarter than her, crunched on their bones and savored the marrow. Let their bloody juices seep from my hands and drip dark trails down my wrists. Bitten through the pale jelly of their intelligent, IQ-heavy brains.

Naomi's would feel like biting into honeycomb, sucking the sweet honey out of every dip and curve.

I shut my lips before hungry drool pooled over.

Like fast-walking through hot, thick wax, I was out the door and onto the sidewalk. Following her scent until she was closer, closer, closer. Once my eyes landed on the back of her cream-colored shirt, dark hair cascading across the shoulder blades- I was running, sandals clapping softly against the ground. Barely giving her a moment to glance over her shoulder at the noise before I grabbed her.

The sound of her rushing heart made my stomach growl yet again.

Shoving her into a dimly-lit alley and against the concrete wall, my hand was cupped against her throat to keep her in place. She grunted breathily, giving out a choked sort of noise as her hand reached up to wrap around my wrist and attempt to force it away. I could smell the scarlet blush that patched across her face and neck. Stilling for a moment, I allowed my kakugan to sink into place as I analyzed her startled expression.

Her eyes were glassy and watering, staring at me as she strove to remain motionless between every shallow panicked breath. Small pieces of gravel crunched under the soles of her shoes, her weight shifted and dragged on the ground.

Leaning forward to breath in her scent, she became very still.

Kakugan nearly rolling back into my head, I took one long inhale. Sweat and cortisol and honey and beet sugar and adrenaline. Licking my lips, I veered down close to her neck.

All of it was  _so_  close.

"It's  _okay,"_  Naomi cried softly, barely audible. She released her hard grip on my wrist and ran her hand across the bone there, soothing the spot with trembling fingers.

One move, and my mouth would be tearing through the sinewy muscle of her neck. But I lingered there, a few centimeters away, eyes wide and lips quivering.

I've always been prided on my self-restraint.

With a heated exhale, I slowly and gingerly pressed my shaky lips to the flushed, smooth skin of her neck, leaving a faltering  _peck_  of a kiss. My hands came off of her, and then I was gone.

No, she was too clever to become meat.

* * *

**Thank you all so much for the feedback and follows.**


	5. Tape

_**Attention:** _ **when this chapter begins, there is a bit of a time skip. A few weeks or so. Just wanted to state that to avoid confusion. Happy reading!**

* * *

As I walked into my apartment, I slid off my charcoal-colored sneakers and slipped into red house slippers that waited by the door. Looking down, I could see that my shoes had left little bits and pieces of bloody crimson footprints on the tiles. I'd have to clean that up.

Padding over to the kitchen, slippers scratching against the floor, I pulled my arms out of the white long-sleeved shirt before slipping it over my head. I stared at the browning blood stain on one sleeve, completely covered from cuff to elbow. Frowning, I tossed the shirt into the kitchen sink and turned the faucet on, dousing it and moving to inspect the rest of my clothing.

Looking down past my slightly toned stomach, I grabbed and twisted at my pale blue-gray jean shorts. Satisfied with their lack of blood stains, I strode back to the sink to deal with the soiled shirt. The water in there had turned a brick-colored shade of orange, bubbling as the faucet's stream whirled into it.

I should have worn my waterproofed white trench coat, the clean-up is simpler.

It's always my duty as Aogiri Tree's second-in-command to fix the plans when they fall through. With the CCG experimenting with Arata technology, missions were becoming a bit more hassling.

But only slightly. The humans just took a minute more to die. How many blood-tinted sets of lips have begged me to let them go home to their spouses and children? How many prayers have been spouted off as I tore their body into thirds and fourths and fifths and sixths and sevenths? Devoting their life to fruitlessly dying for the cause but begging for it back in their final moments.

Pathetic pests with silver suitcases. Easy to stomp on them and wait to hear their bones crunch.

Rubbing the back of my neck tiredly, I finished up and made my way to the bathroom. There I stood in front of the mirror, examining my pale chest to my averagely-built stomach to the trail of short blonde curls leading from my navel down into my jeans. Scratching the hair there for a moment, I leaned forward and parted my lips to inspect my teeth in the mirror. Preparing my toothbrush, I started scrubbing them, until I felt something in between two of my bottom molars.

I fished my tongue around the spot, feeling what was stuck there. Reaching two skinny fingers inside my mouth, I plucked the object out.

It was a tiny puckered piece of skin, a short dark brown hair still attached to it.

I let the leftover snack drop to the bathroom sink's basin, sucking air through my teeth to make sure it was gone. I washed it down the drain with toothpaste and water after brushing my teeth.

Humans are weak. Like creatures made out of tape and tissue paper.

I was reinforced with  _steel._

* * *

"Tatara-san!" Her naive voice sliced through the Tokyo lunch crowd the next day. I walked faster, paper to-go coffee cup in hand. A scorching, piping-hot drop of Caffè Americano jumped out of the plastic top and onto the knuckle of my thumb. I didn't flinch.  _"Tatara-san!"_ Naomi continued to shout, again and again.

Why was she calling for me? How thick was her skull, how empty was it?

I continued striding across the white-painted crosswalk, blending in with dozens of other bobbing heads and nimble-beating chests and anxiously polished shoes. The disgusting smell of hardboiled eggs and setagaya ramen was wafting from a nearby food truck. But even beyond that, it was simple to rinse off and pry between the flesh of these bustling bodies to pick out a quickened heartbeat that was dripping with honey. The smell had a name, and it was stumbling through the crowd to barkingly get my attention.

This is the third consecutive day in a row that I had gone out for coffee, and this was also the third consecutive day in a row that she was shouting at me. Eventually, I would lose her in the lunch crowd and get back to my apartment unscathed, just as I had the previous couple of days.

But the dainty, slender fingers grabbing ahold of my t-shirt? That, I was not expecting.

"Stop…  _moving!"_

She grunted with exertion, tugging on my shirt.

My eyes widened, just slightly.

"You best let go of that while you still have your hand," I spoke calmly, but loud enough that she could hear over all of the noise.

"No," she deadpanned a shout, voice flat. "I won't be able to find you again, if I do."

"All the better, in your case," I called over my shoulder dryly. She ignored me for a moment, and we both kept walking with the crowd, her hand still clinging to the cloth of my shirt. I felt her feet stumble.

One would think that being in a large crowd would dim one's scent.

But not hers.

Even for that short moment of her feet tripping over themselves, the mere three inches that her body moved forward… I could smell that difference in proximity more than anything. It dominated over the black-tied men talking on ear pieces, the high-ponytailed cliques of young women, the harsh roaring of workers from food trucks.

"Slow down!"

"No."

" _Will you even look at me?"_

"I need to be getting home." I didn't want to look at her. Whether it was annoyance or shame, I didn't know.

More coffee spilt over the top of my paper cup and onto my hand.

"You can't spare five minutes?" I heard a hint of desperation, but it could have been exertion from grabbing onto me for so long. She was persistent.

"You're quite a pest."

Naomi was quiet for a while after that.

The crowd began to dwindle and veer off its separate ways. Eventually, she let go of my shirt and sped up to walk at my side. I looked at her for the first time.

The same soft-looking brown hair, same delicate wire-rimmed glasses, same pale creamy skin that was dusted with a light pink color. Even with what few she had, her freckles were hiding in the patchy rosiness. Looking down at her this way, it was easy to see the haphazard way that her hair was parted; as if she had combed through it with her fingers while it was still damp. The tops of her eyelashes fanned out and then upward, getting lighter towards the tips. Her light blue crewneck shirt hung modestly, exposing the shadowing collar bones that peeked out behind a subtle layer of pudge.

My hand reached up to smooth over the light fabric of my breast pocket.

Humans are weak, like creatures made out of tape and tissue paper. As a ghoul, I learned that they only existed to be eaten by us. Looking at this one close up, I could admit that she was beautiful.

But would I be saying the same thing if I were hungry? Certainly not.

"I think you have a death wish," I told her, sipping a bit of my drink as we walked.

"Why do you say that?"

"You followed me," I looked down at her passively, but she continued staring straight ahead. "Going by nature, it should be the other way around."

"Just curious, is all." Her voice was hushed as she massaged her hands together.

Curious? I thought she was clever enough to distinguish between curiosity and annihilation. How many times would I pin her to a wall and threaten to scoop out her insides before she'd catch the hint?

"Can I talk to you?" She wondered aloud, watching a young man zoom past on his silver-painted moped.

"You are."

"I meant… alone," she sighed.

"I have work to do," I replied vaguely, letting my tongue catch a falling drop of coffee from the lip of my cup.

"Would you rather I ask in public?" She countered, voice straining a little. When I moved to stare down at her with narrowed eyes, she didn't look away.

"What do you want?" I continued to glare at her, watching her push her glasses up on her nose with two hesitant fingers.

"Tell me about your work."

I chuckled at that one, low and deep. The saccharine smell of her heartbeat quickened. Did she know what she was asking?

"Why?" I pondered down at her.

"Because I saw something," she mumbled, twisting her fingers together. "And I want to know if I'm  _correct."_

"What did you see?" I offered inquisitively.

"You were on TXN," she answered, referencing to a news Channel and suddenly calm.

I took another gulp of my coffee, expression stoic and placid.

"Is that so?"

She nodded, a hint of a small smile making her apricot-colored lips twitch upwards. I took note of it and continued walking.

"So can we talk, now?" She laid out the bait.

I took it.

"Yes." My tongue lapped and finished up the rest of my coffee, fingers flicking the paper cup into a street trashcan.

* * *

"Must we go to your apartment to talk?"

"I think so."

"If there are cameras or bugs, I could hear them, you know."

"There's none of that to worry about," Naomi reassured, digging in a side pocket of her messy black bag and pulling out a dingy-looking key. "I promise."

Stepping through the threshold of her apartment was like getting sucked into the current of a waterfall. A flash flood of honey and beet sugar and tooth paste and rice wine and sweet coffee grounds and fresh carpet and pleasant hints of perfume and briny sweat… it was monsoon season in there, and I was a tall sugar maple that was about to be uprooted and blown out of its soil.

If I hadn't eaten such a large meal a few nights before, I doubt I would have been able to set a sandal-clad foot inside the quaint little apartment with as much ease.

"Don't worry about taking off your shoes," she spoke at ease, removing her booties and slipping into a pair of house slippers.

The walls were painted a plain eggshell color, dotted with occasional strings of dust. Her windows were cracked open a few centimeters, strange collections of plain-looking pebbles and rocks resting on the sills. A spider plant hung from the ceiling, demure and modest as it dangled from a metal chain. Library books rested on the kitchen counter, a pressure cooker stood proud next to a well-used coffee brewer, conventional white dishes were rinsed and stacked in the sink. Listening closely, I didn't detect any high frequencies that microphones or cameras would be exuding.

Naomi clanked her bag and keys down on the counter. She watched my eyes scan the room and slide open the tall noren fabric divider and peer into the living space, the floor lined with tatami mats.

"Did you find any cameras?" She mused quietly, crossing her arms over her chest.

"I did not."

"You can sit, if you'd like." Her hand waved nonchalantly as she padded into the kitchen, assumedly to make a fresh pot of coffee. I sat down on one of the long-legged bar chairs in front of the kitchen counter. I didn't wait to ask any questions.

"You saw me on the news?" I prodded the topic of earlier conversation, running my finger across the smooth wood-stained surface of the table.

"Well, not exactly," she paused a moment, contemplating. "I  _heard_ you."

This was interesting.

"How so?"

"There was a story on the news, broadcasted from CCG headquarters," she started with her back to me, opening a coffee tin and scooping some out. "Something about a CRc gas plant being invaded by ghouls. Hostages were taken, and all. At one point, the ghoul organization's leader took hold of a CCG officer's earpiece. Said something along the lines of  _'that was the last one.'"_ Her shoulder blades rolled stiffly as she started the coffee maker. "I think that was you."

Even with her back turned, I could hear the smile in her voice. She was confident.

It seemed that she became cleverer each time we happened to meet.

Because she was right. I was the one who rammed through the CCG officers in front of the CRc plant, I was the one who led Noro into the plant's control room, I was the one who sent the Bin Brothers into the production room with gas masks to pierce the metal gas-holding tanks with their koukaku. That was  _my_  plan, and  _I_  had executed it, and  _I_  had won.

"That's quite an assumption," I chuckled plainly.

I was never planning to admit this to her.

"It is," she agreed, turning around to lean the small of her back against the lip of the counter and face me. "But I know your voice well."

"Do you?"

"I would damn near hope so," she quipped, silently implying ' _you've nearly killed me on two separate occasions.'_

"It's an interesting theory, Ishikawa-san."

"I think that I'm right," she smirked, intertwining her hands and moving down to rest them across her stomach. "Please, call me Naomi."

My brow twitched. She was too intelligent, too observant.

"Naomi-san," I gritted my teeth, jaw clenched as I spoke. "If I find out that you breathe a  _word_  of this to anyone… and I  _will_  find out… your organs will paint every inch of the eleventh ward."

She smiled.

"Why not just kill me now?"

I didn't answer her, instead letting my fingernail scrape across my palm. She uncrossed her hands, pushed away from the counter, and walked towards me. Her house slippers skidded across the wooden kitchen floor.

"You're the leader of Aogiri Tree," she confirmed, confident yet timid. Her scent was close, honeydipped and sweet. "You've spared my life twice, now  _three_  times. Why?"

Why? I told myself that I was keeping her alive because she was too intelligent to waste.

But for the first time, with her closeness in proximity, I thought about kissing her.

* * *

**Thank you to those who've given me feedback!**

 


	6. Stitch

**Another time skip here. A week or more. Thanks for keeping up! Let's just pretend for the sake of this story that places of a ghoul's body that are physically wounded are able to be penetrated by normal surgical tools (I know it's not canon).**

* * *

When the shining quinque hit me, I didn't feel a thing.

Moments after, though- an entirely different story. Certainly not the worst pain I'd felt in my lifetime, but the blood that began to spew from the shoulder wound was a bit of a cause for concern.

Pity.

"Bin!" I called for the Bin Brothers, not moving nor taking my eye off of the hazel-eyed investigator as the young man stood poised with his weapon.

His head was hurled off in a second. A single flick of the shorter Bin's bikaku, and it was tumbling down to the warehouse floor, his body not far behind.

" _Oi!"_  Both of the Bin Brother's called in unison, signaling my call had been answered.

Slumped there, the investigator's body was simply a pile of meat now. Like a bag of sand that overflowed and fell onto the ground, spilling blood instead of grit. Pooling there on the floor was a macabre blended mixture of blood and spinal fluid, ever-so-tempting to lap up with my parched tongue. From here, I could spot the yellowish severed spinal cord and the thick meatiness of his shrunken neck muscle.

He was a brave one, compared to the others. Even managed to get a swipe at my shoulder blade with his quinque. But they  _all_  turned into this mouthwatering jumble of fleshy crumbs, warming the concrete as their body turned cold.

Humans are easily broken.

"Tatty-chan~" I heard Eto leap over and halt her dancing next to me. "Did he rip you?" Looking down when she spoke, I saw that her stiff-looking white bandages were flecked with both fresh and dried blood. She stood on the very tips of her toes to reach behind me and press a finger past the torn fabric of my jacket and into the wound, giggling impishly when I hissed in annoyance at the pain. More of the lukewarm blood seeped into my coat as she continued her prodding.

"Just a scratch, Eto-chan."

* * *

Back at my apartment, I cringed as the material of my jacket stuck to the caking, dried surface of the wound. Tearing the fabric away from it hastily, the new scab made a crudely muted ripping noise.

Under normal circumstances, my RC cells would be completely regenerated by now. My lack of a sturdy meal before the most recent mission a few hours ago was interfering with the healing of my wound, which appeared to be fairly deep. When I bandaged it, I turned my back to the mirror and peered over my shoulder, eyeing the thin layer of white crusting fat around the edges of the gash.

I was tempted to go to one of the local medical clinics to get the cut stitched up, it would heal faster that way. Once it was closed suitably, I could hunt and my RC cells would quicken the progress of my injury. But instead, I dealt with it haphazardly, simply because I didn't want to risk having my kakuhou sac detected if I was in need of a physical exam.

I briefly wondered if I could ask Noro to sew the gash up for me, but I then recalled that he wasn't very good company.

Frowning, I covered the wound with a sufficient amount of gauze tape and slid on one of the few black tops that I owned. I didn't want to ruin another light-colored shirt if the cut seeped through. Looking at myself in the mirror, I wondered if my face looked paler than usual or if the dark color of my clothing made it appear that way.

Before I knew it, I was following a sugar-scented trail and hobbling to Naomi's apartment, relying on memory to get me there.

She wasn't far away. It was late, and I needed a favor.

* * *

When she opened the door to her apartment, her scent hit me in waves. It practically coated my sense of smell in a sheet, bruising my roof of my mouth with a stinging hunger.

Naomi looked up at me with her light-colored eyes and grinned. I had to twitch my eyes shut.

"Tat-"

"Coffee." My voice interrupted gruffly, clenching my jaw together. Her scent held too much allure, and a drink would begin to ease the gruelling temptation. "I need a favor, but first I need coffee," I breathed, keeping my eyelids shut calmly.

" _O-Oh!"_ She squeaked after a brief pause, understanding laced in her tone. Smart girl. I opened my eyes to look at her scrambled expression. "Of course, I, uh-" Her voice stumbled a little before she went jogging off into her apartment, leaving the door gaping open. "Just come in!" She called over her shoulder hurriedly, the scraping of her house slippers against the floor getting quieter as she went farther inside.

I stepped in, shutting the door behind me and wincing as the bandage tugged on the perimeter of my shoulder wound. From what I could see, she was hurrying around in the kitchen, leaving cupboards open and shoving a mug of sloshing liquid into a microwave. Peering over the kitchen counter, I could see she was wearing a loose pair of capris sweatpants and a modest tank top.

If her scent wasn't all-too-tempting, her relaxed attire probably would've amused me.

From the side, I watched her cross her arms over her chest, impatiently thrumming her fingers against the fleshy skin of her forearm as she waited for the cup of coffee to heat. After the microwave  _dinged,_  she opened it and ardently paced over to me, careful not to spill. Her fluttering hands held the cup out to me, the dark brown liquid dancing ever-so-slightly inside, letting off an aromatic haze of caffeined steam. She smelled much better than the coffee, but I lifted it to my mouth anyway.

"Thank you," I spoke quietly, politely bowing my head to her for a moment. She nodded, wrapping her arms around herself casually, watching me drink. The sound my throat made as it swallowed was fortuitously similar to that of her heart beating, slow and predictable.

"Better now?" She questioned softly and hesitantly, referring to my hunger as her palm rubbed against the base of her elbow.

"A bit," I answered, voice deep. My eyelids opened a little smoother now, like their axles had been greased. The strain of my aching appetite seemed more bearable.

"You said you needed a favor?"

"Yes," I described, staring down at the top of her head, a few baby hairs sticking up in odd places. "I need stitches on my shoulder."

She stared hard at my chest, expressionlessly deep in thought.

"You were part of that attack on Arata Tech, weren't you?" Her voice seemed curious yet satisfied, like my request was only confirming her suspicions. Her intuition impressed me as usual, and I wondered if she had been watching Counter Ghoul Network before I'd gotten here.

"I led it," I corrected, intimidating eyes looking down at her.

Naomi took a moment to think about this. "Was it successful?"

"Yes."

"Did you kill anyone?"

"Yes."

"How many?"

"I don't count," I admitted, watching her eyes roam over my body, assumedly looking for damage. I could smell when the apples of her cheeks became flushed, her hand coming up to rub the side of her neck embarrassedly as she looked away.

I smirked.

"Sit on the floor in front of the couch," she ordered quickly, accepting my answer and padding hurriedly towards the bathroom in her slippers. "I, um- I'll get out the first aid kit."

Sliding the noren divider out of the way, I walked into the small living room and did as she asked. My eyes bore into the meager space, the red irises glancing to the walls and a dim whitened frosted glass light fixture poking from the ceiling. Opposite me by a few meters stood a dark-stained wooden cabinet, housing a sufficient-sized television that was playing a news channel. 'MUTE' was written across the lower lefthand corner of the screen in stark green letters.

Rolling my injured shoulder a bit and grimacing, I heard quiet noises from the bathroom. Cupboards thudding closed reticently against their rubber stoppers, the crinkling of thin filmy plastic, the harsh clicking of hands snapping a metal box open. After this it was silent, and I listened hard to hear Naomi's heartbeat quicken and then slow.

Remaining quiet and hushed, she didn't come out for a few minutes. Puzzled, I couldn't help but purse my lips, hearing her sigh tensely before stepping out and into the living room.

Her embarrassed flush from earlier was gone, I couldn't smell it anymore. Absently, I noted that she was  _especially_  fragrant when a blush graced her pale skin. In the future, I hoped she would fluster once again.

Even with my tall figure planted softly on the floor, I could see that her thick brown hair had been brushed through with a comb. The now-perfect placement of it made my eyes narrow marginally with amusement. Her hand came up to tuck some of it behind her ear, the motion making her glasses twitch slightly. "Which shoulder?" She muttered, staring timorously at the patterned throw rug, a first aid kit tucked against her stomach under her forearm.

"Left."

I kept my eyes on the muted television. She had always come off as rather shy, but she was behaving  _especially so_  now. Was it because of the time or because of the context?

But my pondering was put on hold, because soon enough she was crawling onto the couch and sitting cross-legged behind me. I watched her in my peripheral vision until it was no longer possible, her knee caps lightly resting against the very bottom of my shoulder blades.

"...Tatara-san?"

"Yes?"

"I think you, ah- might have to remove your shirt," she muttered quietly. My nose wasn't blind to the slight flush of her face, my forehead creasing with amusement. Soon I was leaning forward and shrugging my shirt over my shoulders stiffly, letting out a quiet  _hmph_  in annoyance at the sharp tugging of my cut, which didn't go unnoticed.

" _Wait wait wait!"_ She scrambled, gently resting her hand on the top of my shoulder. "You'll reopen the wound."

"I don't mind."

But her fingers began prodding and pulling at me, easing my shirt over my head in ginger little movements, keeping the stinging jostled to a minimum. The gentleness of her palms made my eyebrows settle comfortably against the bottom of my forehead, and with a bit of unease, I realized that my guards were down.

I stopped thinking.

"There you go," she breathed to herself once she managed to twist the shirt off, setting it beside her on the couch cushion. I felt my chest tighten in the slightest, the colder air swatting at my shoulder blades without the warmth of my shirt in the way. From behind me, I heard her open the metal first aid box and rustle through it with tentative finger tips. "I'm going to start now, okay?" Naomi said softly, resting her flat hand hesitantly square on the center of my back, thumb just barely grazing the corner of my bandaged shoulder. The pain hardly registered, instead concentrated on the flushed, soft skin of her palm.

She pulled at my makeshift gauze, and all I could smell was honey and adhesive tape.

As she was setting the soiled dressing to the side, I felt a trail of blood race down the contours of my back. She caught it with her hand quickly, grabbing a tissue and letting it absorb the mess. "I'm going to clean the cut now, alright?"

"Hn," I grunted in reply.

The alcohol being blotted into the rather deep wound hurt more than the entire ordeal put together. Out of the corner of my eye, red-soaked cotton balls were piling up on the metal lid of the first aid kit. It made me grin lightly.

"You're awfully quiet," she suddenly noted softly, applying more pressure. The alcohol was pungent.

"I'm concentrating."

"On?"

"My shoulder."

"I see." I felt her squeeze some skin glue in the pits of the wound, squeezing the sides together. More blood trickled down my back. "How'd you get this, anyway?"

"I was distracted," I said sorely, turning my head to watch her take out a crescent-shaped needle and tie nylon thread onto it.

"You should be more careful." Her voice was soft-spoken and her fingers moved gingerly, tying a knot on the end of the thread and starting to stitch up the very first part of the cut. "If your subclavian vein was hit, you'd have bled out." She was quick and gentle with the threading, the lips of the wound closing shut with some light pressure.

"You must have done this before."

"Mhm, many times," she replied after a short pause, assumedly concentrating. "I'm a nurse."

She leaned closer, and the full ends of her hair grazed the sensitive skin of my mid-back. Ignoring my hungry stomach, I breathed her in. Sugar and honey.

"Nurse, hm?" I questioned, closing my eyes as the needle shrugged through my sore flesh.

"Jikei General Hospital." She said more after that, but I didn't listen to the content, only the tone of her voice. Quiet and soft. I enjoyed the feeling of my long lashes relaxing against the slightly protruding bags underneath my eyes. I concentrated on the volume of it, the little breaks in between words when I could smell her breath more clearly.

Her touches were kind.

"You must have a high tolerance for pain," she noted after a minute or so, rubbing her fingers lightly over the stitches that she'd given me so far. I opened my eyes and nodded.

"I've become used to it."

There was a long pause.

"I wish that weren't the case," she admitted softly, snipping the end of the thread with miniature silver surgical scissors.

On my face, there was the start of a ghost of a genuine smile. Something akin to tenderness was in her voice, but then it all-too-quickly passed.

"All done," She said quietly with a hint of pride, covering the stitched wound with gauze and rough opaque medical tape. Her hand lightly patted the surface of the bandage. "I'll…" She grunted faintly, reaching for something. "Now, I can finally put your shirt back on."

I don't particularly bite at the chance for banter, but I was tired enough to set aside the predisposition.

"Why, does it fluster you?" I queried curiously.

"Does  _what_  fluster me?"

"Having my shirt off." There was no mistaking the scent of her warm blush. Merely by inhaling, I could already imagine it trailing down her neck to flush her chest. "Your face is red."

"Oi, you aren't even looking at me," Naomi mumbled, toying with the leftover cotton balls in the first aid kit. "How would  _you_  know?" My chin grazed the heel of my shoulder as I turned my neck to look at her.

"I can smell it."

" _You can?"_

"Nh," I grunted back, straining my scarlet-colored eyes to focus on her own, which were barricaded by the television's reflection in her glasses. Settling on the patchy, rosy hue across her nose, I listened to the silence and to the sound that her fidgeting hands made. The baby hairs on top of her head fluttered in the brisk draft of the room, and I admired the pale skin at the jutted turn of her exposed shoulders.

From down on the floor, I noted that I had never seen her from this angle before. My tall frame was used to looking down at her small stature. Other than her nervous hands, she was very still, and I noticed that she was charming with a very plain, delicate guise. When she shifted her head a bit, I could finally see past the reflection of her glasses. With them resting low on the bridge of her nose, I could spot her light slate-colored irises.

"Of course it flusters me," she muttered with a chagrined purse of her lips.

I was having an internal war between gargling the taste of her sweet-scented blood or burrowing my nose deep in her thick, shoulder-length wavy brown tresses.

Slowly, she crawled off of the black cushions of her couch and onto the floor, kneeling in front of me as she gingerly slipped my dark shirt back over my head and onto my torso. Her eyes widened from behind her glasses as her hand grazed the warm skin of my chest, taking my arms and gently pulling them through the sleeves. I watched her silently, the thick strap of her casual tank top slipping down across the ridge of her shoulder.

"You're a lot warmer than I thought you would be," she noted softly, moving one hand away to push her glasses higher up on her nose.

I didn't speak, because she was beautiful.

Her eyes were averted as her hand lingered there on my shoulder lightly, the touch delicate and dainty. My face remained expressionless, watching her eyes waver and her throat bob as she swallowed. Looking down, I could see that there was a smudge of my blood on her hand that was beginning to dry around the edges.

That did it.

And then I was leaning forward, cupping the side of her neck with the palm of one hand and roughly pressing my lips to her mouth. Her pulse quickened underneath my fingers before she broke apart for a moment, her lips ghosting against mine.

" _How_ many people did you kill today, again?" She breathed, her knees scooting forward clumsily on the floor. I could feel her rosy cheeks against the tip of my nose.

"Many," I answered quietly, clutching onto the space just below her jaw, thumb skimming the flesh there. Her breath smelled sweet, I could taste it on the back of my tongue.

She nodded, just barely, before I kissed her again roughly; her lips responding with nearly as much intensity. My hands were very still, whereas hers were shakily traveling up to press the toasty heel of her palm to my sideburns. When my pale cheek touched hers, I could feel the warmth of her blush there.

Her pulse ticked rapidly underneath the pressure of my fingertips.

Growling into her mouth, I kissed her harder.

* * *

 

**Thanks for reading! I've loved the feedback that I've gotten, keep it up, it makes me happy.**

**Author's Note:**

> Transferring this story from my FanFiction account.


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